Winter already?!?

I don't even know what to say except....UGH!!! We currently have over two feet of snow, single digit temps, and one cranky mama!!

Pumpkin Patch

The 2nd grade class has a running tradition of the pumpkin patch. It's a small plot of land a few blocks from the school that the owners have agreed to let the kids use. Every year the class harvests all of the pumpkins and then sells them at the local fall festival. Then later this year, they will go and plant more pumpkin seeds for next years class.

Fall Festival

Last weekend Cody had their Fall Fest. It was a fun morning. They had a few games for the kids, some local businesses had booths set up, and of course some locally grown produce. This all was set up in the corner of the Albertsons parking lot. Gotta love small towns!

The 2nd graders always sell the pumpkins from their pumpkin patch. Dustin is quite the pumpkin peddler :) One of their jobs was to help carry pumpkins to the cars. Overall a good experience for the kids.

4H had their miniature horses there and Riley was in heaven. They even let her in the pen to help brush. She informed me that she wants to be a part of that club! Although she has to wait until she 8!!

They also had a climbing wall set up and tater wanted to give it a try.

Coming down was his favorite part.

Some random pictures

Wyoming Wilderness

Everyone here is always telling us about all of the elk out here and how BIG they are, so last weekend we all loaded up and went to see if we could find them. It took awhile before we found some, although we heard them long before we sighted any of them. They are in their rutting season right now, so you can just hear them screaming. It was pretty cool. Matt's been wanting to practice his elk call (for his hunt next year) and I have to say he's getting better. He got quite a few bulls talking to him!

We didn't get as close as we had hoped. 2 reasons... 1.) The kids were with us and weren't too crazy on hiking, they were getting cold. 2.) Apparently the elk (and cows) up there have been terrorized by wolves lately, to the point were Game and Fish came out last week and shot 3, so I wasn't too crazy about the idea of getting too far away from the pickup!! But we did manage to get a couple of pictures of them.

Look... there are trees in Wyoming :)

Of the few pastures I've been to on this ranch, this is my favorite. There is a huge reservoir here and lots of trees and pretty country. I was told that there are some big fresh water shrimp in this watering hole!!!

Also, this pasture is where the wolves have been hanging out :(

Fire Season

Right now there are a lot of fires burning in the area, but none super close to us. Yesterday the wind was blowing just right and within 30 minutes, we could not see the mountain behind our house because the smoke was so thick, and the smell was very strong. It made us think it was closer then it actually was.

The sun was a blood orange color. These pictures don't do it justice.

That time of year again....

Every fall I am amazed at how much my kids have grown. Really....it's just hard to believe how big they've gotten. But it's been a fun adventure and I wouldn't go back for anything :)

I got quite a few good ones of Tater...the trick was to take Matt along and he kept Dustin smiling and laughing for me, so I didn't get to many 'dorked out' shots!! Riley was the tough one this year. I really didn't get any great photos of her, so I'll probably try again soon. She won't mind..she loved posing :)